I just came back from a short vacation to India. I had gone to my cousin’s wedding, and as always, I have come back with fresh ideas and a new approach to life. The following are just some lessons I’ve learnt during my short stay:

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Lesson #1: Be grateful for the cards you’ve been dealt in Your life. There will always be someone out there who is better off than you are, but there will be ten other people in worse situations. This is apparent in India, as you see poverty everywhere from the local food market to the high-end malls.

It brought tears to my eyes and made me realize how much I’d been complaining about what I had. I’m incredibly lucky to have a roof over my head, food on the table, and two parents that love and support me financially.

I really have nothing to worry about, and if I don’t buckle down and use my resources to follow my dreams than I’m an absolute fool.

Fitness Application: Use the resources you have to create your training program and improve your fitness. Stop thinking you need to go out and get an expensive gym membership or buy That perfect training implement or book to get the results you want.

Lesson #2: India is a nation with lots of people and very little opportunities. In such a situation, you can’t just sit there and ask for a free hand. Instead, you need to create your own opportunities. This may mean selling fresh juice on the side of the street, or moving to a different state to join a new construction project.

No one is going to come up to you and say, “Hey I’m going to give you a million bucks for your new brilliant idea.” You need to go and take your brilliant idea and show people what you can do with it. This is one of the biggest mistakes I’ve made in my promotion with Shah Training – I really wasn’t doing much in the way of promotion.

You need to be an individual marketer, but instead of marketing a product or service, you need to market yourself as someone who can solve people’s problems.

Fitness Application: Stop looking for free advice or free training. Nothing is free and no one is going to help you unless you show them that you have the potential to succeed. Believe in yourself and understand that only you have what it takes to work hard and succeed with your goals.

Lesson #3: Learn a new skill, even if you don’t want to. You need to understand that you don’t know everything. One of the fundamentals of website promotion is Search Engine Optimization (SEO). There are entire companies employing numerous consultants who do SEO work for a living.

For a small-time website such as Shah Training, I needed to first master the fundamentals: SEO. I taught myself how to read HTML and PHP , so why couldn’t I conquer SEO? The truth is, that I’m still not an SEO expert, but I’m learning and finally seeing the results from my efforts.

India has a very low literacy rate, and this showed me the power of the Internet and other resources, of which I have access to. It doesn’t hurt to crack open a book about a topic that may not be familiar to you. You learn by doing, and you succeed by learning.

Fitness Application: You learn by doing, so go do it. Stop waiting around the perfect training program or asking a million different questions on a dozen different forums. Do your own research, learn the essentials, and get cracking in the gym, your bedroom, or in your backyard.

Lesson #4: Fate is a common theme in India. One that took me a long time to grasp. I’ve realized that there are two main ways of looking at fate.

The first way is to believe that everything that is happening to has already been written, and there is no way out of a particular situation despite your best efforts. And so the best way is to just live life, even if you’re unhappy with your current situation.

The second way of looking at fate, and one that I prescribe to, is to understand that circumstances are out of your control, such as the fact that you may be born poor, someone close to you may pass away, or that you are involved in a car accident.

But the most important thing is the decisions and approach you take to improving your current situation. Decisions are within your control. The most important thing is the you make decisions with a willingness to succeed for a better life.

Fitness Application: Don’t worry about a bad day. Make the best of your situation, and just keep going. Keep track of your training and diet so that you can make changes for improvement. Don’t think that some people are predestined to have a great physique and you’re going to be fat or scrawny for the rest of your life.

Use these life lessons in your approach to health and fitness, and you’ll succeed with all of your goals.